Cooking for a Crowd – In Good Taste

Minestrone Soup from Healthier Traditions: Italian Cookbook

Maris Callahan — Fri, 22 Mar 2019 22:22:21 +0000

When people think of Italian food, nutrition is not often the first thing that comes to mind. When I think of Italian food, I think of Romeo’s, a pizzeria and restaurant in my hometown that serves everything from pizza by the slice and fresh subs to baked ziti and rigatoni ala vodka. I think of Giada De Laurentiis’ classic Italian lasagna made with homemade tomato sauce, homemade bechamel sauce, beef, spinach and three different kinds of cheese. I also think of Italian friends whose Sunday dinners and holiday meals can best be described as “carbs on carbs on carbs.” That’s why it’s truly a gift to all of us that there is a new Italian cookbook to help us satisfy our Italian food cravings with more nutrition and just the right amount of carbs. The Transamerica Center for Health Studies is a nonprofit dedicated to helping employers and consumers achieve the best value and protection from their health coverage. Healthier Traditions: Italian Cookbook is the fourth edition of the Healthier Traditions Cookbook series with 18 recipes created and reviewed by registered dietitians. I love that each book in the series focuses on a different type of cuisine: Italian, Mexican, American […]

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Easy Baba Ghanoush Recipe

Maris Callahan — Fri, 22 Feb 2019 06:00:15 +0000

Besides the fact that it’s fun to say, Baba ghanoush is actually quite fun to make, too. Baba ghanoush sounds like it would be overly complicated to make, but in reality, this easy baba ghanoush recipe is simply eggplant blended up with lemon juice, tahini, garlic and sea salt. While most recipes ask you to char the eggplant on a grill or over the flame of a gas stove, you can also use your broiler to achieve smoky flavor while saving time and energy. This tip proves to be especially useful, too, if you have neither a grill nor a gas stove, which is not uncommon for those of you cooking from your first or “starter” kitchen. Baba ghanoush, which resembled traditional hummus, is a Levantine dish of cooked eggplant mixed with onions, tomatoes, olive oil and various seasonings. You’ll find it in Middle Eastern cuisine but you’ll also find it in the supermarket next to the packaged prepared dips and spreads. What’s it taste like? It’s creamy, tastes way more decadent than it actually is and has a balance between slightly sweet notes and savory undertones from the lemon and tahini. It’s naturally vegan and gluten-free so you can serve it to pretty […]

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Orecchiette with Roasted Butternut Squash and Kale

Maris Callahan — Sun, 18 Nov 2018 18:00:46 +0000

Orecchiette with Roasted Butternut Squash and Kale is a hearty, vegetarian dish that comes together quickly – perfect for weeknights – and is packed with healthy ingredients and nutrition. Brad and I have been together for a little over three years and living together for about two. We rarely fight, our values are very similar and we have a lot of the same aspirations and goals for our futures. Sounds perfect, right? This is where I’m going to tell you that my boyfriend is a picky eater. Although he is very good about trying new things or eating around the offending ingredient, there are certain things that are straight up off-limits: avocado, mushrooms, beans, quinoa, and — you know where I’m going with this — roasted butternut squash and kale. In contrast, I will eat just about anything except for the combination of peanut butter and chocolate. There are a lot of things I’m not especially fond of (ham, oranges, popcorn are all foods I could live without) but there are few ingredients that I’ll refuse to eat when they appear in a composed dish full of other things that I like. Even though Brad refused to touch this dish […]

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Asian-Style Capellini with Ginger and Vegetables

Maris Callahan — Tue, 06 Nov 2018 22:34:43 +0000

I miss summer. I miss summer for all of the reasons I like summer, but I also feel like a saner person during the summer. From June through September this year, I did a great job at eating healthy, working out almost every day and doing all of the things you’re supposed to do when you have about 60 pounds to lose. Then, like clockwork, October rolled around and I completely lost my momentum. I’ve maintained a 20 pound weight loss (only 44 more to go!) but for whatever reason, the changing seasons completely zaps any motivation that I have to get to the gym regularly, cook more at home instead of resorting to ordering food delivery every other night and eating foods that make me feel good instead of foods that make me say “why did I eat that?” That is why the world needs more healthy, hearty pasta dishes. This capellini pasta recipe is an adaptation of a recipe from a Weight Watchers cookbook and is one of three that I shared this morning on a CBS Chicago segment about healthy swaps to make in your favorite pasta dishes. There are a lot of ingredients I love in the […]

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Slow Cooker Spiced Apple Butter

Maris Callahan — Mon, 01 Oct 2018 13:00:54 +0000

Can you tell I’ve been on a slow cooker kick recently? Between making bolognese sauce in the slow cooker and rounding up 10 slow cooker recipes that I’m dying to try, you might say I’m a little bit obsessed with the idea of “set it and forget it.” So, it should come as no surprise that I decided to take three pounds of apples from the farmers’ market and make slow cooker apple butter. I used to claim fall as my favorite season, because of one day in 2006 when I was at my first job in New York City. During my lunch breaks, I would take walks just to get out of the office and get some fresh air. New York in the summer can be kind of disgusting, what with the garbage piled on the streets and high-reaching humidity. Fall there was always, quite literally, a breath of fresh air. I remember taking a walk on a particularly crisp day in early October and feeling hopeful and excited. I was probably excited to do things like pick apples and buy my annual bag of candy corn, bake pumpkin bread, consume copious amounts of apple butter and look forward […]

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